Shooting is sixth of year at local area

Shooting is sixth of year at local area

Five other shootings have taken place this year - three of them fatal - within a mile of Friday's incident.

• Feb. 18 - Domnick Sherrell, 17, is fatally shot in the 1300 block of North Orchard Knob. His girlfriend's mother, Margaret Harris, is charged in the death.

• March 4 - Ronald Blackmon Jr. is shot in the head on Sheridan Avenue and later dies. Edward Ryals, Jr. and Demetrius Bibbs have been charged.

• March 5 - Prandell Haynes, 20, is shot in the hand and a 3-year-old is shot in the leg at an apartment at 2300 Wilson St. No arrest has been made.

• March 13 - Saundra Williams, 20, is shot in shoulder and face while driving in the 1800 block of N. Hawthorne St. No arrest has been made.

• April 5 - Cordarrius Jeronell Armour, 22, collapses and dies after being shot in the chest at close range shortly before 9 p.m. near the Okie Dokie Mart at 1900 Roanoke Ave.

Source: Chattanooga police

Five or six young men were arguing Friday afternoon at the spot where a 23-year-old man was shot in what police call a gang-related incident, nearby residents said.

Tracy Long Jr. told police that he was walking in the 1700 block of Wilson Street about 2 p.m. when a man drove up next to him, chatted briefly then shot him in the leg with a shotgun, Chattanooga police Officer Rebecca Royval said.

Long was taken to Erlanger hospital, but the wounds are not life-threatening, she said.

The shooting was gang-related, she said.

Jonerica Laster, 15, said she was riding in a car along Wilson Street when she saw the group of men arguing. She said she didn't know if the men were gang members and she didn't see any guns, but the argument seemed heated.

"It could be gang related," she said. "There were a whole bunch of dudes and they looked like they were going to fight."

There have been three fatal shootings and two other shootings with injuries this year within a mile of Friday's shooting, which took place among Bushtown, Glenwood and Avondale. Though the incidents don't often involve people who live in the area, Jonerica said attacks still affect local residents.

"I think somebody's going to break in the house and say, 'Give me all your money,'" Jonerica's 7-year-old sister Edra Hart said, miming a gun with her hands.

The family has lived on Wilson Street for about two years, the girls said. Their mother was inside the home Friday evening while Edra rollerskated around the front yard and her sister looked on.

If trouble starts, Edra said she knows what to do.

"I have to take off my skates and go in the house and hide," she said. "I don't care about my skates; I care about getting inside."

Several Wilson Street residents said incidents like Friday's shooting are preventable and that city officials need to create programs to help young men.

"They're putting all this money into Chattanooga for tourists. They need to be putting it out here," said Jeffrey Young, a three-year Wilson Street resident. "Put money in this neighborhood and give these kids something to do."

When he was growing up in Hamilton County about 30 years ago, Young said there were sports and job-training programs to help people from high school through their mid-20s. Today, he said, bored teens without jobs easily fall into trouble.

"They just have to have something to occupy their time," he said. "These boys don't have anything but anger."